Tonight's picture was taken in March of 2004. Mattie was almost two years old and very engaged with his environment! Peter snapped a photo of us playing around. I did not know he was taking it at the time, but I am so happy he caught this moment on camera.
Quote of the day: A kidney stone walks into a bar. Bartender says, 'What'll you have?' The kidney stone says, 'No thanks, I'm just passing through.' ~ Unknown
My day started bright and early with going to the hospital for a second set of xrays. I was really hoping they would tell me I passed the stone without me knowing it. NO such luck! With kidney stone pain, it can come and go, or perhaps I have gotten so used to the pain, that I don't know what it feels like to be 'normal' anymore.
Any case, while waiting to be called for an xray, I noticed a familiar radiology tech. Mattie never worked directly with Brandon (the tech), only his cousin Jey. But I knew who Brandon was as I met him many times Mattie was undergoing testing. It was ironic that Brandon helped me today, because as I was walking to the hospital I literally looked at the building and thought to myself...... my son died in this building and for the most part no one in there even knows who Mattie was, because of turnover. That commentary always upsets me as the nature of Mattie's hospital has changed so much since we lived there in 2008 and 2009. Seeing Brandon today reminded me of my days traversing the hallways with Mattie.
After the xray, I went up for my doctor's appointment. Unlike last week, this week, my appointment started off with a resident. I realize people need to learn and Georgetown is a training institution, but I truly have little patience for residents. So much so, that when Mattie was in the hospital, residents and medical students knew NOT to come in our room. Because I would throw them right out. Mattie's day to day situation was so volatile and he was so fragile, that we really did not need a clueless and insensitive resident coming in and making us repeat our story over and over again.
Today's resident was a pip. Nothing wrong with his personality or demeanor, however, he started off the conversation by saying that he heard (probably from the person who called me a day or two ago about financing the surgery) that I had concerns about paying for the surgery. He kept going on and I interrupted him. I explained that the woman on the phone was less than professional. Unfortunately there are many in the health care field that shouldn't be there! This woman called me and said she was going to do an intake. So I was expecting something medical oriented in nature. Forget it! She simply called to tell me the pricing of the surgery, anesthesia, what insurance would cover and what I was responsible for. This caught me by surprise, as I had no paper with me, and yet she was rattling off numbers, deductibles, and so forth. Needless to say, I stopped her several times to write things down (when I located some paper) but was non-committal as to how I was going to pay for this because I really wanted to check her facts and to make sure she investigated this potential claim. Therefore she agreed to call me next week to find out what I learned.
So this leads me back to this resident. I basically told him the whole story. Then I said to him I had NO IDEA that the way I was going to pay for this surgery should influence his medical decision one way or another. Either I need surgery or I don't need surgery. Naturally we can pay for the surgery, but that wasn't the point, and I certainly did not expect to be having this conversation with my medical provider. I gave the intake person a hard time because her whole demeanor was hostile and she had a lack of regard for the fact that I was the patient.
This is a photo of my new friend... this collapsible container with a screen at the end comes with me where ever I go. The thought is I will use it to catch the stone. We can only hope.
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